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Articles by Peter Altman

Pete is the Climate Campaign Director for the Natural Resources Defense Council.

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For some representatives, the health of schoolkids just doesn’t seem to be the priority.Cross-posted from the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Some questions should be easy to answer. But, with Congress, some things are never easy. Fresh off the House vote to let polluters dump unlimited amounts of carbon pollution into the air, a House subcommittee under the jurisdiction of chair Fred Upton (R-Mich.) will start to consider letting polluters dump unsafe amounts of toxic pollution into the air.

You see, for years a lot of polluters have avoided having to reduce their emissions of toxic pollution — this is the hard-core stuff that causes cancers, birth defects, developmental disorders, etc. Power plants, cement kilns [PDF], and other industrial plants [PDF] have either never had to meet clean air safeguards for toxic pollution, or have not had to meet effective ones. By updating clean air safeguards on toxic pollution, the EPA will save over 25,000 lives per year.

The EPA’s stronger safeguards to protect against toxic air pollution will have profound benefits for health at the local level. As USA Today document... Read more

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